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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27344857">you make everyone look like they aren't anyone</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/seasalttears/pseuds/seasalttears'>seasalttears</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Dead To Me (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>i can't do angst with soulmate aus i just can't, oh look i delivered, v sappy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-02</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 11:22:20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,816</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27344857</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/seasalttears/pseuds/seasalttears</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>The color is called brown, and Jen thinks the color must be boring if it’s named something like fucking brown. Obviously she doesn’t know if it is or not, but every time someone asks her what color her soulmate’s eyes are or what color she can’t see, she points to the stumps of trees and the hardwood floor of buildings. </p>
<p>soulmate au</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Judy Hale/Jen Harding</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>69</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>you make everyone look like they aren't anyone</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>YES i finished it because i would feel bad if i didn't. enjoy fuckos</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The color is called brown, and Jen thinks the color must be boring if it’s named something like fucking <em>brown</em>. Obviously she doesn’t know if it is or not, but every time someone asks her what color her soulmate’s eyes are or what color she can’t see, she points to the stumps of trees and the hardwood floor of buildings. And then someone always says, <em>Oh, brown</em>. It’s never, <em>Oh</em>, brown. So Jen just assumes her soulmate has boring eyes and she’s not really missing out on much. The colors she can see are pretty enough anyways.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It kind of sucks sometimes though, because brown is apparently absolutely fucking everywhere. Like this building with the big, round columns and a circular skyway—it’s not brown but it’s surrounded by a ton of fucking boring, gray trees. No matter how dull brown seems, gray is even worse. It’s times like these where the evidence of her loneliness forces her to look straight at it and she just wants to scream at the top of her lungs, begging someone to hear her. The loneliness has always been the worst part, and casual dating is usually out of the question when you’re aware your destiny is out there somewhere, waiting.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>At this point, though, Jen feels like giving up. She’s tired and she’s alone and she can’t see brown. She’s accepted that’s all she’ll ever be, the furthest she’ll ever get in life. Well, at least she can dance; that’s the one thing she has going for her. But right now, she’s kind of regretting ever slipping on a pair of ballet shoes. This event is a fine arts showcase apparently, and her presence has been required due to her unmatched abilities in lyrical dance at her company. It’s not Jen’s fault she’s the best, so she doesn’t understand why she has to suffer in heels for hours while smooth talking donors and pretending she gives a shit about any other art than dance. Like, there are fucking painters here? Jen didn’t think people did that anymore, or that it was like, a profession.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>The venue is screeching with anticipation, big groups of people gathering in clumps to observe and comment and gossip. She’s already taken her obligatory pictures to prove she actually came, and now she’s free to do what she wants until it’s socially acceptable to leave. She smooths out the invisible wrinkles in her dress, fingering the lilac fabric anxiously. Jen looks around the room and sees pockets of gray everywhere, a part of gazing she’s gotten used to. Sometimes it doesn’t even feel like she’s missing a color, the hues of gray so second nature to her now that the only thing reminding her of her perpetual solitude is, well, the solitude.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>She stops at a painting, shades of green and blue spread all over the canvas, a mirage of things she can see, but a few streaks are gray. Occasionally there will be times Jen thinks something is brown and she can’t see its actual color, but it actually just ends up being gray; she stares at the broad, languid strokes on the canvas and wonders if this is one of those times. She feels someone else walk up to the painting and look at it, and she’s almost tempted to turn around and ask if they know whether those strokes are gray or brown when something catches her eye—a flash of something unfamiliar, in one of the far corners. Was that? It couldn’t be, brown is more boring than whatever Jen just saw. She sees it again though—another flash of a color she doesn’t recognize—and Jen steps closer to the painting, scrutinizing to try and understand. But the closer she gets, the more the new color starts to fade. Frustrated, she turns around to ask the person standing near her and sees gray hair and a red kimono first—</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Jen! What are you doing here?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen jumps a little and finds Christopher sidling up to her. “Come here, hurry.” She grabs his hand and pulls him close, turning back to the painting to point out the brown she can see but only finding gray again. “No, no, no, no. <em>Fuck</em>.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Christopher looks back and forth between her and the painting, a confused look on his face. “What am I missing here?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen sighs and closes her eyes, trying to keep her pending anger at bay. “I could’ve sworn I started to see brown on this painting.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Um, there is brown on that painting.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yeah, but I can’t fucking <em>see</em> brown, remember?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Oh right! Wait, does that mean—”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“No,” Jen cuts him off before he can finish. “I don’t know. It doesn’t matter, it was probably just a trick of the light or something. I can’t see it anymore anyways.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Christopher accepts the answer, beginning to ramble on about the latest drama in their company. Jen looks back at the painting one last time, trying to remember a color she can’t see.  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Well, this is fucking depressing. Jen honestly doesn’t know how her life became some big joke, but somehow it has managed to become worse than she already thought it was. Marrying someone who isn’t her soulmate used to be at the top of the list, but now it’s losing the person who wasn’t her soulmate in a hit and run. Ted not being her soulmate isn’t the defining factor of their marriage nor not the only part of him, but it’s how Jen has always thought of him. It’s not that she didn’t love him, because she did. In a way. She just knows it was never the thing everyone talks about when you find that one person who is <em>it</em> for the rest of your life. Her and Ted built a beautiful life together though: they have a nice house, two beautiful boys, and Jen hasn’t fully succumbed to misery—so yeah, it’s a beautiful life.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Well, it was. Ted is dead now, and Jen doesn’t really know what to do about that. She’s sad of course, but it honestly feels like she’s mourning what they could have been if his eyes had just been fucking <em>brown</em>. They met when they were younger and became fast friends, and as the years passed and neither of them found their missing parts, it just kind of became an agreement between the two of them that they would settle for each other. They were getting older and they wanted more out of life than the monotonous waiting game they had been subjected to. But Ted’s eyes weren’t brown and neither were hers and they never would be, and Jen is still here, alone and joining a grief group so she can work through whatever the hell it is coursing through her mind and body right now.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>It’s a bright day in Laguna, the sky stark and the ocean waving—and Jen wants to burn it all down. She thinks maybe she’s grieving not for herself, but for her boys and the father they lost. Maybe she’s grieving for the fact that she’s middle-aged, washed up, and lonelier than she was twenty years ago. Anybody would grieve that, right? And the fact that she’s sitting in a circle of people talking about their feelings is even more depressing, and Jen is starting to think she never should have come at all.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I see we have some new faces here today. Would either of you like to introduce yourselves?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen looks away, not willing to give out any information on herself just yet. A woman to her left speaks up, a timid voice declaring her name Judy. It kind of sounds like bells, this woman’s voice, and Jen is compelled to finally look over at her. She has gray hair—must be brown—and a striped shirt on. Jen thinks she’s cute, from the little of her face she can see. Jen isn’t really listening to what she’s saying, too enraptured by the feeling of something slotting into place inside of her. It’s confusing, and she doesn’t know why she’s suddenly warm all over, and it’s not until Judy glances over at her and they make eye contact that—</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Oh, o<em>h</em>. It’s <em>her</em>, this… Judy.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They’re sitting five feet apart with somebody in between them but Jen can still see the kaleidoscope in Judy’s eyes and the way different shades of brown meld together, creating something new and so… glorious. Jen feels her breathing pick up when she notices the way Judy’s eyes—her <em>brown</em> eyes—light up in a way that is probably mirrored on her own face. It takes a lot for Jen to look away but she does, and it’s like her entire world has shifted on its axis. The trees, the ground, the cars, the ocean—all of it looks <em>different</em>, and it’s because Jen has finally found the other half to her existence. She always thought brown was going to be boring, but really she was just angry that she hadn’t witnessed it’s wonder yet. Now Jen knows brown could never be boring, not when it’s infused into Judy’s eyes like that, amber and hazel and bronze and sepia moving in a dance Jen wants to learn.</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>It’s not until later that it occurs to Jen maybe she should be surprised by the fact that her soulmate is a woman. It’s not unusual, she just always assumed it would be a man for some reason. But with the way Judy is looking at her across the table in the restaurant they’re sitting in after grief group, Jen thinks Judy is better than any version of a man the universe could have conjured up for her. Maybe it never occurred to her to be surprised because everything about Judy just feels so normal, so <em>right</em>. Maybe Jen isn’t angry that she was lonely for so long, because she thinks she would wait another forty years for the woman sitting across from her and smiling with a lightness that could rival the sun. Judy blushes under Jen’s gaze, whispering a soft <em>What?</em></p>
<p>
  
</p>
<p>Jen smiles back, “Nothing. Just looking at you.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p>They sit at their table, talking for hours on end as they slowly discover each other. Jen has always hated meeting new people because it just served as disappointment, but she would meet Judy for the first time every day for the rest of their lives. They’re right next to each other, but something deep inside of Jen wants to pull Judy impossibly close; it’s innate need, and Jen feels tethered to the woman in front of her.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They only get up to leave when it’s getting late and Jen says she needs to get home to her boys, Judy’s face falling into a surprised <em>oh</em> when she learns Jen has kids. Jen makes a note to ask about that later, but for now she’s focused on Judy in front of her, hesitating in front of their cars like she doesn’t want to say goodbye just yet. Jen knows the feeling.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“So, I’ll call you? And we can plan something?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Sounds lovely, Jen. I’m really happy I met you.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I would hope so, considering you can see green because of me now.” Jen laughs lightly, but Judy’s face contorts into an expression Jen doesn’t understand. “What is it?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Judy cringes, “I actually couldn’t see green <em>and</em> blue.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Really?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Yes, which is something I was always confused about. But I get it now. Your eyes… they’re something special. Something beautiful.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen just stares, disbelieving that her soulmate—the person she is destined to love for eternity—is someone like Judy. Jen never thought she deserved the good things in life, always settling for second-best, but Jen thinks Judy might be able to show her what winning feels like. It’s all she can do to gently grab Judy’s hand and pull her closer until their lips touch, a soft sigh escaping into the night and Jen isn’t sure which one of them released it. It might’ve been both of them, and Jen likes that option best. Judy kisses like she wants to stay, so Jen kisses her like she never wants to leave.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>This has to be over—this thing between her and Judy—they only bring each other chaos, an inability to let each other live with peace. But it hurts, because it is so much more than just a <em>thing</em> that can be over; they’re <em>soulmates</em>. It’s a cosmic joke in Jen’s opinion, that the way her and Judy were finally brought together were under circumstances of death and deceit. They killed each other’s partners, for fucks sake. So this has to stop, this has to be the end. It’s not about colors and soulmates and happy fucking sparkle time anymore, their lives are well and truly fucked now.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>That doesn’t make it hurt any less though, she still feels like a part of her is being ripped out from the inside—nerve endings and veins and all. Telling Judy the truth about Steve’s death and then forcing them to say goodbye was one of the hardest things Jen has ever done. Harder than choosing to marry someone who wasn’t her soulmate and harder than losing her mother, if Jen is being honest. There’s an inextricable line of fate tying her to Judy, and the farther away they are from each other, the harsher that string pulls. The inside of her will probably yearn with a fierce tenderness for the rest of her life, and Jen isn’t sure if she’ll ever be able to learn to live with it. The reverberating slam of her car door as Judy left was like a siren in her head, an unforgiving warning.    Soulmates weren’t meant to say goodbye.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>She walks through the front door after getting home, prepared to down a bottle of wine and cry herself to sleep. Walking into the living room, Jen sees Henry and Charlie sitting on the couch, hunched over something on the coffee table.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hi boys, how does pizza for dinner sound?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Henry turns towards her with a pout on his face, achingly similar to Judy’s. “Where’s Judy? Is she not here tonight?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen sighs, willing herself to keep her tears from falling while she responds, “Actually, Boop—”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Mom,” Charlie cuts her off, “is this actually you?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“What?” Jen makes her way over to where they’re sitting to see what they’re looking at. It’s a photo album from when she was younger, some keepsake Christopher made for her for one of their “friendiversaries” or whatever the fuck. It’s opened to a picture of her and Christopher at one of those fine arts events they were forced to attend when they still danced, smiling with their arms wrapped around each other.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You look so happy here,” Charlie remarks, and Jen feels a little bit more of her heart break.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I was. That was a long time ago, though.” Jen sits down next to Henry, running her hands through his hair as she pulls the album closer. Her hair is shorter and curlier here, makeup very much a result of the decade. She remembers that dress—a light shade of purple with delicate details—and the way she felt in it. She also remembers that event, the memory seared into her brain; it was the first time… it was the first time she saw <em>brown</em>. But Judy wasn’t there, was she? It’s impossible, but her seeing brown without Judy there is also impossible.  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>“This is my favorite picture,” Henry says, flipping the page. It’s another picture of her and Christopher, candidly walking next to each other. Jen squints, and there—the painting—she can see the brown and the green and the blue. It all looks so different now. Casting her eyes over the rest of the picture, Jen notices a flash of red. Pulling the album even closer and finding her glasses on the coffee table, she studies the figure faintly in the background. Red kimono, brown hair, upturned nose… Jen remembers that shade of red, she knows that nose. <em>Fuck</em>, it’s <em>Judy</em>. Jen’s chest feels like its caving in and it takes everything in her to control her breathing. Judy was there, all along, the whole time. She gasps softly, saddened by the time they missed out on because they were both always one step out of bounds.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen’s broken out of her reverie by Henry’s soft voice, “Mom?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Um, yeah, this might be my favorite picture too.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hello?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Um, Judy?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“<em>Jen</em>. Hi.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Can we talk?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen drives around the circle drive, taking a right into the side lot. She parks, takes a deep breath, and gets out. It’s late, and the night air wraps around her like a cold blanket; if this were Brooklyn, she would be able to see her exhales in the wind; but if this were Brooklyn, she wouldn’t know Judy. And Judy… Jen has really fucked this one up. Somehow she has made a mess of the striking destiny she was awarded in this lifetime, and every step towards their meeting spot both breaks her and saves her. She can see brown now, but she never really expected it to look different in the moonlight, dim rays wrapping around the colors she can finally see.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen turns the corner and she sees Judy, sitting on the bench she described. No one else is around, the building and its columns asleep already, and Judy looks up at the sound of Jen’s footsteps. She slows when she gets closer, trying to remember Judy’s amber in the nighttime she never really savored before—just in case she never gets another chance.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hi.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Hey.” Jen takes a seat next to Judy with an impossible distance between them that Jen wants to breach, but doesn’t. “I’m sorry.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“For what?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Are you serious?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Judy’s mouth opens and closes a few times, apparently trying to find the rights words to explain to Jen her never ending compassion. “I just wasn’t sure if something else happened or if you were apologizing for, you know.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen takes a second, “Yeah. I know. And I am so, so sorry.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Me too—”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Stop. You’ve already apologized and I’ve already forgiven you.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Judy stares at Jen in disbelief for a few seconds. “You have?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You would’ve stopped, Judy. I know that, I <em>do</em>. It wasn’t your fault.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“But I’m the one who <em>hit</em> him—”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You would’ve stopped.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Okay.” Judy goes quiet, and Jen wants to fill her empty spaces.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I’m the one who needs to be apologizing here, Judy. For the things I said and lying to you and pushing you away when I really needed to be holding you closer. I can’t tell you how sorry I am.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Jen, it’s okay.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“No, it’s not okay—”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Jen. It <em>is</em> okay. I’ve already forgiven you.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“What?” Jen’s eyes widen, amazed at the marvel sitting next to her. What did she do to ever deserve someone so <em>good</em>?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You shouldn’t have lied, but I know the kind of person Steve could be and the kind of person he was. I wanted to have a life with him so I chose to ignore it, but then I met you.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen scoffs, “You found your colors and not much else.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Judy grabs her hand and Jen thinks it might be an instinct, “Stop it, don’t say that. I found so much more than just blue and green. I found my soulmate, I found <em>you</em>.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen shifts her fingers and grabs ahold of Judy’s hand, holding on tight. “What a shitty way to find me.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>They laugh lightly, and both of them know nothing about this is particularly funny. “Yeah, I guess it was. I don’t like it either, but I also can’t say I regret it.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Does it make me a bad person to say I don’t think you should regret it either?” Jen feels the tears fall before she even knows they’re forming, and Judy gently wipes them away.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“No, it doesn’t.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Fuck, maybe we are right for each other.” Jen laughs for real this time, and her chest is starting to feel a new sort of lightness to it—like a long-held weight is slowly starting to lift.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I think the universe decided that a long time ago.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Who is it up there that has it out for us?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I don’t know, but I’m not mad about it.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Because you’re never mad.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You think too highly of me.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>That is for sure,” Jen teases.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Judy lightly swats her arm before sobering, “Can I ask you something?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Shoot.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Why did you ask to meet here?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen takes a moment to find the words, memories stumbling around in her brain. “I came here for a fine arts event when I was younger. My dance company used to force me to go to things like that all the time, and one of the last ones was here. It was right before I met Ted.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“What was so special about this event?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen looks at Judy, and something in the nutmeg accented irises tells Jen that Judy knows what she’s trying to say. “I saw a painting, some abstract piece with green and blue all over it. But there were a few parts of it I couldn’t see, they were gray.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen pauses and Judy gently prompts her, “And then what happened?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I saw brown for the first time, and I figured out you were there too. We were so <em>close</em>, Judy. We missed each other by mere inches.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“Everything happens for a reason.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I just wish I could’ve met you sooner. I want forever with you.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“You have me, Jen.” Judy wraps her arms around Jen’s shoulders and hugs her, rubbing light circles on her back. “Can I tell you a secret?”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen shivers at the sound of Judy’s voice in her ear and nods.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I know what painting you’re talking about because it’s mine.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen pulls back to look at her, “How…”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>“I used to avoid using green and blue in my paintings because, well, for obvious reasons. But with that painting, I don’t know, I guess I just wanted to use something that wasn’t mine yet. So I mixed a bunch of grays together and that was the result.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Jen can’t find the words to tell Judy how much she loves her, so she kisses her instead. They still have so much to talk about, so many things to work through together, but for now Jen is going to enjoy this moment, here, with Judy. They’ve earned this, and Jen doesn’t feel like wasting anymore of the time she so constantly craves. Even forever wouldn’t be enough with Judy, they could live out eons and Jen thinks she might still wake up every day and fall in love with the woman holding the universe within her.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>@jensblazerhoard on twitter</p></blockquote></div></div>
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